Grazing corn as finish tool update

[KMacGinley]

I can see your point, if I was going to do that in Wisconsin, I think I would want those calves born in Sept for sure.

 

[longtimelurker]

How many acres per steer assuming you take them off when the ears are gone?
Also, if not corn, what would be your second choice crop?

You can figure that by the roughly 200 cow-days/acre number. I think at 200 CD/acre they will have eaten most of the ears. At least the ones still in the air.

I am a corn person. I have no idea how or if this would work with other crops. Most other crops do not stand well through the winter especially with the deep snow I often have, winds and/or just naturally drop their seeds.
No they don't get as fat but in this case that may be good. But I am just an ag machinery engineer who likes beef experimenting with cattle...

Jim

Jim if they are eating 56 pounds of shelled corn per day, and they don't get as fat as feedlot cattle, something is wrong with your cattle. I think your math maybe be off a little bit. Either that or you are wasting feed with this practice.

 

[angie1]

We've been eating meat from Limousin cattle for a couple of years now and it is very lean but the tenderness and flavor is out of this world.

It is my understanding that Limousin cattle are double muscled, which would account for the tenderness of their meat regardless of finish and absence of marbling ~ yes?

 

[SRBeef]

How many acres per steer assuming you take them off when the ears are gone?
Also, if not corn, what would be your second choice crop?

You can figure that by the roughly 200 cow-days/acre number. I think at 200 CD/acre they will have eaten most of the ears. At least the ones still in the air.

I am a corn person. I have no idea how or if this would work with other crops. Most other crops do not stand well through the winter especially with the deep snow I often have, winds and/or just naturally drop their seeds.
No they don't get as fat but in this case that may be good. But I am just an ag machinery engineer who likes beef experimenting with cattle...

Jim

Jim if they are eating 56 pounds of shelled corn per day, and they don't get as fat as feedlot cattle, something is wrong with your cattle. I think your math maybe be off a little bit. Either that or you are wasting feed with this practice.

Good thinking. As I said somewhere above, I actually have been pushing them to much more than 200 CD/a as you can see in this picture:

My plan is to have them put on weight faster by moving the steers and heifers to be processed through quicker than the well over 300 CD/a I used this past winter when trying o reduce hay consumption for the whole herd.

Realize I just recently decided to keep all non-harvest prep animals off of corn. The 200 CD will be for next year and may be a bit low. You are correct at 200 bu corn that would be a 56 lb bu/day...I don't think they can eat that much especially when they have to take the cob and some leaves too!

Also my corn will probably not be 200 bu any more since I have reduced my N fertilizer application rates this year even more than last year. And yes there will still be some "waste" but this is why I am looking to bring in the cows as a cleanup crew on the second wave rather than going one massive time through as shown above. Maybe 250 or 275 CD and figure some left would be more accurate to have them put on more weight and not leave too much for my retained animals.

I will also have some hay available to them to keep their diet more balanced which will also reduce the amount of corn they can consume. But that is OK. I am not looking to produce feedlot type fat cattle. I just want 1050 lb of 12-13 mo old steers with minimal external fat but taste very good and are tender. My first carcasses this spring show me I am there with the taste and tenderness - just need some more pounds.

Thanks for the thought provoker. In the end I will just leave the to be harvested group on a small area of corn until most of the ears disappear then move them. We'll see how many CD that is.

Edit: To put it simply, if I am going to require the cattle grazing corn to clean it up to the degree shown in the photo above (almost zero waste of grain and upper stalk, etc), they are just not going to put on the pounds as fast as I need them too or as if they were in a feedlot. In the future I am not going to require animals to be harvested to clean up a field to this degree. I really don't know how many cow days that will be. I'm still learning. But a second wave of cows cleaning it up will reduce the waste without giving them problems. I hope. Jim

 

[longtimelurker]

I'm guessing you will need between 2.25 and 2.5 head per acre of those 1050# steers in order to keep the feed wasted to a minimum.

 

[Red Bull Breeder]

We've been eating meat from Limousin cattle for a couple of years now and it is very lean but the tenderness and flavor is out of this world.

It is my understanding that Limousin cattle are double muscled, which would account for the tenderness o
f their meat regardless of finish and absence of marbling ~ yes?

You won't find double muscled Limousin cattle in the US. Not many doubled muscled Limousin cattle anyway.